LOS LORCAS: Poetry in Concert

In the spirit of Federico Garcia Lorca—gifted musician, legendary poet/playwright and ebullient performer—poets Partridge Boswell and Peter Money, along with fiddler Jakob Breitbach and guitarist Nat Williams, fuse poetry and music in a passionate and surprising mash-up. Los Lorcas blur boundaries between spoken word and song, weaving poetry with Andalusian ballads, blues, rock, folk, reggae, hip hop, Americana and jazz in pursuit of the cante jondo (deep song) Lorca ardently championed.

The house band for the Grolier Poetry Book Shop, Los Lorcas explore common roots and synergies of poetry and music, celebrating the poetry of song lyrics and music of lyrical poetry. Inspired by artists diverse as Lorca, Yeats, Marley, Dylan, Dickinson, Springsteen, Kavanagh, Matisyahu, Morrison, Brooks, Cohen, Bowie, U2, Lumineers, Heaney, REM, Merwin, Millay and others, the group’s timely and soulful compositions weave themes of love, loss, homelessness, empathy, activism and gratitude—all through a filter of the American dream. Veteran Vermont musician and producer Kristina Stykos has taken a shine to the new trio: “A lot of great musicians have come around here, but not with the poetry chops that this group has—in spades. A project sprouted from the literary side, their cross pollination blending poetry, personality, musicality, vitality of many colors and creative intensity is so satisfying!” After years of honing their distinctive genre-bending blend of music and poetry on stages across the state, country and internationally, Los Lorcas recently released their debut album LAST NIGHT IN AMERICA on Vermont’s Thunder Ridge Records label.

Troubadouring widely in the US and abroad (Ireland, Canada and Slovenia), Los Lorcas have performed everywhere from farmhouse kitchens to pubs, coffeehouses, schools, theaters and 1,000+ book and music festival crowds [e.g. Boston Book Festival, Poetry Center San Jose, San Francisco State University, Massachusetts Poetry Festival, New Orleans Poetry Festival (w/ Cornelius Eady), Harvard Square Octoberfest, Burlington Book Festival, Levis Corner House (Ireland), Tucson Book Festival, Bookstock Literary Festival (w/ Robert Pinsky’s PoemJazz), Chandler Music Hall, Strokestown and Cork Poetry Festivals (Ireland), Vermont College of Fine Arts, Salt Hill Pub, KGB Reading Series, Cantab Lounge, Bowery Poetry Club, Nuyorican Poetry Café and Caffe Lena]—attesting to the broad appeal of their liberating vision of how poetry and music are two sides of the same spinning coin which together render a mesmerizing symbiosis.